Ship component cost: Adjustments only affect wealth cost
Suggestion:
TN mineral cost of components would only be adjusted (increased / decreased) based on component size (HS).
All other adjustments such as for techs and modifiers, would only affect the complexity (wealth cost / build time).
HS size changes will still affect Wealth cost of component.
Wealth cost would also not be used when calculating the maintenance points / upkeep of a component.
Make the scaling of increased cost more severe (it only affects Wealth) for these adjustments & tech levels.
Reason:
Would give more uses to Wealth (throughout game).
Would allow for better techs to be more TN mineral 'efficient'.
Better immersion (maybe) in terms of better technology feeling less like a game of 'Tetris-for-fitting-more-TN-into-the-same-volume-for-more-space-magic'.
Would help delay late game TN mineral starvation.
Wealth, while reserves and income are limited, is infinite. And can be scaled up via Technology or more colonies.
Example:
Consider the following two engine designs (under the current system)
Ion Engine (Tech 4)
Engine Power 125.00 Fuel Use Per Hour 125.00 Litres
Fuel Consumption per Engine Power Hour 1 Litres
Size 10 HS (500 tons) HTK 3
Thermal Signature 125.0 Explosion Chance 10% Max Explosion Size 31
Cost 62.50 Crew 10
Military Engine
Development Cost 625 RP
Materials Required
Gallicite 62.50
Conventional Engine (Tech 1)
Engine Power 10.00 Fuel Use Per Hour 10.00 Litres
Fuel Consumption per Engine Power Hour 1 Litres
Size 10 HS (500 tons) HTK 3
Thermal Signature 10.0 Explosion Chance 10% Max Explosion Size 2
Cost 5.00 Crew 10
Military Engine
Development Cost 50 RP
Materials Required
Gallicite 5.00
Note that the Ion Engine is x8,3 more expensive in terms of Gallicite, since it has x8,3 times the Engine Power.
Currently if I increase the power (from 100% to 150%) of the Ion engine, then the Gallicite cost goes up from (100% to 150%), along with increased fuel cost and such.
Similarly, if I adjust power down, or tech the TN cost changes along with it.
The suggestion would be that the TN cost is based purely on HS of the component (with a base cost of somewhere in the region of the fourth tech in the series for this component. )
And all other adjustments to the engine only adjusts wealth (though more severely. )
So all engine techs would cost 4 Gallicite per HS, from Tech 1 to final tech.
But for wealth while Tech 1 might only cost 1 wealth per HS, tech 6 (Ion) might cost 7,59 Wealth per HS, and tech 15 (Photonic) would cost 291,92 wealth per HS.
I used 1,5 ^ (Level - 1), but that is just as example. The actual scale can be whatever. I would make it a database column, so it can be fine tuned as needed.
For things like the "Engine Power" dropdown, the adjustment to the Wealth cost could follow the same formulae as the fuel efficiency calculation (More power means quickly scaling more cost, less power means diminishing cost savings. )
Etc. etc.